Lost has developed a tradition since its third season: if an episode focuses on Ben, that episode will be awesome.

"The Man Behind the Curtain," in which we see how Ben came to the island -- and in which Ben tries to kill Locke for the first time: awesome.

"The Shape of Things to Come," in which Ben loses his daughter and fights it out with the Widmore kill squad: awesome.

And now "Dead is Dead," which finds Ben back on the island, claiming that he's returned to summon the smoke monster and have it judge him for his past sins.

To be sure, he has plenty of them, but can we trust anything Ben tells us? All of this plays out in an episode that gave us -- yet again -- another great showcase for the talents of Michael Emerson and Terry O'Quinn, the resolution to a troubling plot thread, and some cool island back story. Like I said: awesome. And I'm overusing that word.

In a lot of ways, this hour played like a companion to the previous Ben-centric episode -- last year's "Shape" -- answering, at least partially, some of the questions that were raised back then.

Why do Ben and Widmore hate each other? How did Widmore lose control of the island? How does Ben summon the smoke monster? Will he ever make good on his promise to get revenge on Widmore for Alex's death by killing Penny?

Of course, I'd have to be a pretty mean guy to tell you those answers right here. We'll sound the spoiler alert, and give the DVR/iTunes/On Demand crowd time a chance to clear the room.

OK, first up: the giant, collective sigh of relief we felt when Ben wasn't able to go through with his promise, lowering his gun once he saw little Charlie peek his head out of the lower deck of Penny and Desmond's boat. But I get the sense that he didn't want to shoot her at all. He seemed hesitant, and as the episode plays out, we see what was going through Ben's mind.

Charles Widmore, way back in 1988/1989, has a chance to kill baby Alex and doesn't. When Alex is in danger in 2004, Keamy -- Widmore's goon -- may have pulled the trigger, but Ben realizes that he had a chance to stop that, and didn't. I'm guessing that's why he couldn't then kill Widmore's daughter, and maybe what had him thinking about being judged.

(Of course, this didn't save him from getting an ass-kicking from Desmond, who we learned was responsible for the injuries Ben had when he left for Flight 316 a few episodes back.)

This is a very, very different Ben, just as returning to the island has shown us a different Jack and a different Locke.

Actually, that different Locke and the different Ben are pretty much tied together. One of the joys of this episode was seeing Locke not only resurrected but rejuvenated, looking confident and ready to take charge. (This was the first time he's seemed taller than Ben, even though O'Quinn clearly has a few inches on Emerson.)

And Ben hates it. He admits as much. It only takes a few hours of this role reversal -- Locke having the answers, Ben having the questions instead of the other way around -- for him to start chafing. But Locke's in charge for now. The smoke monster judges Ben and lets him live, but not before Alex returns -- I'd say this is the island speaking through Alex's spirit, or something like that -- and tells Ben not to try to kill Locke again. We're seeing Ben's desperation and doubt, and Emerson played it beautifully.

Incidentally, that was an amazing scene all around. All those hieroglyphics under the temple were enough to keep Lost obsessives busy for days (more on that in a minute), and the moment where the smoke enveloped Ben --crackling and making its eerie noises -- was handled quite well. (I'm with Noah Murray of the Onion, who compared it to the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.)

But the scene before that was quite intriguing as well. Lapidus returns to the beach to find that Ilana and some men have cracked open a big crate of guns, and are taking over.

"What lies in the shadow of the statue?" she asks Lapidus. (This may be some sort of Dharma-type code, like "What did one snowman say to the other?")

Anyway, this leads me to my usual list of questions/observations:

Who is Ilana working for? It has to be Widmore, right?

Is she referring to THE statue, the four-toed one?

And if so, and that statue represents the Egyptian god Anubis -- that's one of the theories these days -- what does that mean?

The system for summoning the monster seems to involve Ben draining water from a hole then calling down into it. Very weird, very cool.

Michael Emerson was creepy and amusing as the younger Ben ("teenaged punk Ben," I called him in my notebook). Alan Dale was flat-out menacing as the younger Widmore.

Speaking of which: Widmore gets banished from the island for leaving and fathering a girl with an outsider. Doesn't Ben basically do both those things?

I think we can safely say that Sayid shooting Ben had no effect on the present. Ben doesn't remember it, and still wants to join the others. And based on the show's timeline, it seems like he was with them for many years before the purge, as was Ethan.

Once again, phew...Penny's safe.

ABC didn't provide artwork for his episode, so I used one of their many portrait shots of Ben.

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Tom:

You gotta love the way the writers foreshadowed Ben's handling og his opportunity to kill Penny. He snatches Alex and spares Rousseau, and then 20 years later sees Charlie and doesn't fire.
Yet he doesn't remember Sayid shooting him as a child? What a contrast.

I can't say I didn't enjoy seeing Desmond put a beat down on Ben. That was brutal.
We will probably find out Ben's bullet for Desmond was stopped by a can of soup, or something else as thick.

How about Ben's description of the Temple and the wall around it? Man, I can't wait to see what else is hidden there. (Besides Smoky's private basement rec room!) That's where Ben told the Others to all go hide when the assault team showed up.

So here's the thing. Widmore sent Desmond to Ellie, to pass on Faraday's message to his Mom.
I have no Doubt Ellie gave the same info to Widmore, so Illana could have been hired by Widmore. OR NOT. Wouldn't she have known who Ben is?

And if Widmore was banished for having a child with a woman "Not" an other, that means Ellie can't be Penny's Mom. So scratch that theory.
I'm glad Penny's alive.

One thing about Lost, ther are no "Red Herrings"
That Penny, Desmond, and lil' Charlie are still around can only mean they have a purpose in the story.
It might be in the series finale, but they have a purpose yet to be played out.

Have to say it again: Gotta love that Temple and the Hieroglyphics.

So Sayid's seductress want's to know what the statue looks down on?
And how about Ben gunning down Caesar right after making an Alliance? Shades of Brutus betraying Caesar on the Ides of March, wouldn't you say?

Could Illana be part of a new Dharma initiative group, looking to reclaim the stations and bring it all back online?

This definitely lived up to the preview as an episode filled with answers. I'd give it a A- only because I thought that the whole judgement scene was pretty hokey and the "resurrection" of Alex ("do what Locke says!") was a bit too much deus ex smokima for me to handle.

The best scene was Ben shooting Caesar and saying. "Consider it my apology." That has to be one of the best sequences of the series and what a great time for a commercial cut. Whomp! Great editing.

I guess I will have to capitulate to the statue being Anubis based on the hieroglyphics in the temple. They gave us a nice, long look at it just to be sure.

I absolutely connected Ilana's line with Desmond's "snowman" code. Like all the best episodes, it answered many questions while bringing up so many more.

Was it my imagination or did Ben look like a glorified Boy Scout in his younger days. What was he wearing. For some reason it reminded me of Hammy from Pee Wee's Playouse (can't find a single image on the web.)

Chris -- While we're on the subject of people not remembering things: Why didn't Rousseau recognize Ben when she found him in the jungle in season 2?

Holden --Ben's wardrobe definitely reminded me of a Boy Scout. He's never not been creepy.

Posted By: Tom C. | Apr 9, 2009 11:44:49 AM

See, I don't think Ilana's working for Widmore at all. I got the sense that she and her gun-toting buddies have been infected with whatever it was that made Danielle's crewmates go crazy in the past. (I know we haven't seen them go into the temple yet, but they know about the statue, which seems like it's connected, so I'm guessing they had SOME kind of run-in that we haven't seen yet).

Also, I don't think we can assume from this episode that Penny and/or Charlie are still alive. I'm guessing we'll find out in a future episode that that confrontation didn't end when Ben landed in the water. Would Ben really have felt so guilty if all he'd done was non-fatally shoot Desmond?

Posted By: Brian Callaway | Apr 9, 2009 12:10:40 PM

Brian -- I think you may be onto something about Ilana getting the island sickness.

As for Ben...
He might feel guilty about trying to kill Penny, although then he'd maybe direct that apology to her and not Desmond.

But I don't think the timeline works: Ben would have to fish his gun out of the harbor -- or go get another one -- and then go back and try to kill Penny (and maybe Charlie), and then head back to catch the plane. Keep in mind that someone might have called the police, and that Desmond Penny and Charlie probably got out of there.

No, I think Ben's apology was just a way to build suspense.

Posted By: Tom C. | Apr 9, 2009 12:17:14 PM

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